52 PEOCEEDTNGS OF THE ALBANY MEETING 



In his address at the memorial services in honor of Doctor Hilgard, 

 January 30, 1916, Prof. E. J. Wickson said: 



"But great as were Hilgard's services to educational science and policy, it is 

 probable that his achievements and influence in agricultural research in the 

 United States will be counted greater. Even if we disregard the incalculable 

 value in his assumption of the agricultural point of view in connection with 

 his geological work in Mississippi, and count his services from his beginning 

 in California, he still stands as the founder of American institutional research 

 in agriculture, including both laboratory and field work." 



On same occasion Doctor Loiighridge, his life-long companion and 

 friend, said : 



"The mind and hand of Professor Hilgard were never idle and, while en- 

 gaged in solving soil problems in relation to soil fertility and plant life, he was 

 ever on the alert for new ones. The results of his activity are shown in the 

 hundreds of published articles in the experiment station reports, outside jour- 

 nals, both foreign and domestic, government publications, etcetera. In 1906 he 

 published his large work on soils, comprising about 600 pages, and regarded 

 by him as a summary of his life work on arid and humid soils. 



"His broad and thorough scientific knowledge, his great work on soils, and 

 his valuable publications brought him not only a world-wide fame, but many 

 honors, among them the degree of LL. D. from the universities of Mississippi, 

 Michigan, Columbia, and California ; the Liebig gold medal from the Academy 

 of Sciences, Munich, Bavaria, 'for important advances in agricultural science' ; 

 other gold medals from the expositions at Paris, Rio de Janeiro, and Saint 

 Louis ; membership) in several scientific societies, among them the National 

 Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of 

 Science, in which he was made a life member just before his death. In 1883 

 he received the offer of i\.ssistant Secretary of Agriculture from President 

 Harrison, and leave of absence was granted by the board of regents of the 

 University ; but, much to his regret, health conditions compelled him to decline 

 it. In 1903, the fiftieth year after graduation, he received from the University 

 of Heidelberg the semi-centennial diploma reconf erring the degree of Ph. D. 

 in recognition of distinguished services in the sciences of geology and agricul- 

 ture. Only one graduate besides himself has ever received this signal honoi"." 



In reviewing the career of Doctor Hilgard, one is impressed with the 

 fact that from the very first of his scientific activities in Mississippi the 

 subject of the soils has engaged liis attention, and that he has persistently 

 followed that thread in all his later work. As one of the most recent of 

 the geological formations, the soil must be considered in its geological 

 relations in any official geological report; but od account of the intimate 

 connection between the soil and the oi'ga.nic life of the land, and especially 

 in its relation to all human activities, the supreme importance of the soil 

 is obvious. These facts were in the mind of Hilgard when, in his first 



